Lucka tio

Thank God for tea! What would the world do without tea!
How did it exist? I am glad I was not born before tea.
Sidney Smith (1711-1845)

888

Jug. Vessel. Pet-form of of Joan, also of Judith. So also Middle English jobbe, jubbe, used by Chaucer for drinking vessel, is probably from Job, often Jubbe, Juppe in Middle English, whence modern names Jubb, Jupp. It is even possible that jug is altered on the female name from the earlier jub. The jug, or stone-jug, i.e. gaol is from thieves cant.

TABLE CLOTH

VARP: cotton 12/2 and cotton 8/2
WEFT: cotton 12/2 and cotton 8/2
REED: 55/19 1-2
NUMBER OF THREADS: 1022

almond-rhubarb-cheesecake-squares

My darling woke me up at 6:30 when he wanted to come in and share my pillow. I like mornings but I'm not a morning person — but today I couldn't go back to sleep so I left the bed — and my darling — and went out to harvest some rhubarb before it gets woody.

This is what I came up with — almond-rhubarb-cheesecake-squares.
We're such a small household that I need to freeze most things I bake and cook. I've found that you can freeze almost everything — even if the recipe tells you that you can't! As bars are so much easier to put in boxes and freeze, and only thaw one or two at a time, I seldom make pies or round cakes. That's the reason I made this pie in a 20 x 30 cm pan.

Make a pie dough and line a pie plate or other pan with it.

Beat
200 g cream cheese
with
½ cup raw sugar
1 cup ground almond
1 egg

stir in

3 cups rhubarb

pour the mixture in the pie crust and sprinkle with

½ cup chopped almonds
3 tblsp muscovado sugar

Bake at 200°C for 10 minutes. continue baking at 175°C for about 30 minutes.

You can find a conversion calculator at http://www.worldwidemetric.com/metcal.html

THE RED PEONY

THE RED PEONY

Voluptuous green so leisurely and tranquil

and robe of red now light, now dark

heart of the flower sadness about to break

but how could we know this from such spring colours

88888888888Wang Wei, ad 699-731

8888888888888translated by D. Lattimore

The same poem translated by A Waley

The deep green foliage is quite and reposeful,

The petals are clad in various shades of red;

The pistil droops with melancholy —

Wondering if spring knows her intimate thoughts.

..'tis an unweeded garden,

I needed a break form the domestic chores and spent some time in the garden with the camera.

Packing

I'm running around trying to be efficient while the sad truth is that I hardly know what I'm doing.
Piles are growing high on the floor, lists are growing very long in the computer and heaps of clothes are everywhere. We're going to the island in a week. Two weeks in my paradise on earth.
It takes a lot of planning since there are no shops on the island and we have to carry everything up to the cottage from the boat. Well, that's a qualified truth - our neighbor’s kind and strong teenagers meet us when we arrive and before we are half way up they are on their way back after carrying all our stuff up to our cottage. Food for body and spirit for two weeks — it is surprisingly heavy. As I can't get on-line from there I'll lose myself in real books.
But also just sit and look out over the Baltic Sea.

Lovely books for a weaver

From "Ancient Egyptian and Greek Looms" by H. Ling Roth
Illustration of a Greek woman with a tapestry loom. From Stackelberg’s Graeber der Hellenen.


The other books were not about weaving but I cannot resist the lovely illustrations in all the wonderful old children's books.
There are many more pictures of people and animal who spin than of weavers — I found several pictures of spinners on Saturday.














From "Mother Hubbard her Picture Book" with the original coloured pictures, an illustrated preface & odds & end papers, never before printed. By Walter Crane.

From "Mother Goose" illustrated by Richardson, Frederick, 1862-1937


"Favourite Fairy Tales" illustrated by Jennie Harbour


Where are you going, mother mine?
I’m going to sit by the old grapevine,
And watch the gliding swallow bring
Clay for her nest from the meadow spring—
Clay and straw and a bit of thread
To weave it into a baby’s
88

From "Title The Peter Patter Book of Nursery Rhymes" Illustrator Wright, Blanche Fisher

Lucka nio

The blessed drink of early morning tea.

88888888Jan Struther (1901-1953)
8888888"Three Stockings"

87

Mug. Cf. Low German mokke, mucke, Norwegian mugga, Norman dialect moque. Origin unknown, but perhaps originally a personal name (cf. jug). Hence perhaps mug, face early mugs often representing grotesque faces. With mug, muff, duffer, cf. crock and also French cruche, in the same sense. To mug up (for an examination) may be an obscure metaphore from theatrical to mug up, make up one's mug (face) with paint.
From "An Etymological Dictionary of Modern English" by Ernest Weekley

The garden today

Saturday — again

from Chatterbox Stories of Natural History, 1880

ooooooooo

Not that I mind Saturdays, oh no, I enjoy my Saturday mornings very much. That's when I listen to my favorite radio program and check what's new at Gutenberg. But I do mind that I never seem to keep up with life in between Saturdays.

There are twenty-four hours in a day. There are seven days in a week. There are four weeks in a month. There are twelve months in a year.

These are the seven days,—Sunday, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday. These are the twelve months,—January, when it is often very cold; February, when it is dull and dirty; March, when the winds blow; April, when the flowers begin to come; May, when the trees are in bloom; June, when the hay is made: July, when it is so hot; August, when it is harvest time; September, when apples are ripe; October, when the farmers brew their best beer; November, when London is covered with fog; and December, when Christmas comes.
From Aunt Mary's Primer:
Adorned with a hundred and twenty pretty pictures. Printed in 1851

Or between Januarys.... The strange thing is that life is picking up speed all the time. (Because it is downhill?) I remember an episode form when I was around six years old. My mother was working hard to get everything ready before the guests would arrive. I was looking forward to the event and was hanging around in the kitchen — probably being a nuisance to my poor mother — asking how long is it before they come? She tells me it'll be 45 minutes. I sigh and say something about that it is such a long time. Whereupon my mother also sighs and says: no, I don't think so. How relative things are.

There are not always books that interest me but it is always interesting to see the wide spectrum of books. I'm sure Henry Ward Beecher's speech on slavery is interesting — but not what I'm looking for this warm morning. So I skip it as well as "Jungle Tales of Tarzan" and "Northern Nut Growers Association Report of the Proceedings at the Fourteenth Annual Meeting Washington D.C. September 26, 27 and 28 1923". Only a few books caught my attention this morning so I checked on all books by "Anonymous" (always thinking of Virginia Woolf when finding something by Anonymous). There is much to be found — I haven't even had time to go through all I found today.

A Book of Fruits and Flowers
shewing

the Nature and Use of them,

eitherfor Meat or Medicine.

I found this lovely book from 1653 and got totally absorbed in it. The picture of the strawberries reminded me of my strawberry patch that is more of a weed patch.... There is where I should be now instead of having tea on the verandah. The only thing I miss is a Tart of Straw-Berries. Of Straw-Berries.

A Tart of Straw-Berries.
Pick and wash your Straw-Berries clean, and put them in the past one by another, as thick as you can, then take Sugar, Cinamon, and a little Ginger finely beaten, and well mingled together, cast them upon the Straw Berries, and cover them with the lid finely cut into Lozenges, and so let them bake a quarter of an houre, then take it out, stewing it with a little Cinamon, and Sugar, and so serve it.

Revised rhubarb cake

The rhubarb is growing so fast that I sometimes don't have time to use it before it gets too wooden. But I had some sour cream that needed to be used before I had to throw it away so I decided to make rhubarb squares. My old recipe has a nice texture but is way too sweet so I thought I could improve it by using less sugar - and different sugars as well as adding almonds and ginger.

Mix until crumbly and set aside:
1/3 cup muscovado sugar

1 tsp. ginger
3/4 cup chopped almonds
1 tbsp. butter

Cream together:
3/4 cup raw sugar
1 cup butter
1 egg

Mix
2 cups all-purpose flour

1 tsp. ginger
1 tsp. baking soda

Add to creamed mixture alternately with
1 cup sour cream

Stir in
2 cups rhubarb, cut into ½-inch pieces

Turn into a greased 10x10-inch baking pan.Sprinkle with reserved topping. Bake in 350°F oven 45 to 50 minutes.